“Hamas is responsible and Hamas will pay,” said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the emergency Security Cabinet meeting June 30 following the discovery of the bodies of Gil-Ad Shaer, Naftali Frenkel and Eyal Yifrach. Now it emerges that the three kidnapped youths were murdered by their abductors 18 days ago, close to the time of their June 12 abduction.

The desire to extract a steep price from Hamas is more than just an expression of anger and an attempt to assuage the Israeli public's desire for vengeance. It is also meant to deter Hamas. The question is: What are effective means of deterrence?

In the course of the second intifada, then-Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz used to convene a brainstorming team every Thursday in an effort to halt the wave of suicide bombers that flooded Israel. The team included the highest echelons of the defense system (Shin Bet, Mossad, Israel Defense Forces and police) and occasionally psychologists and sociologists were also invited. The goal: to formulate creative ideas for effective, efficient deterrence of the terrorists and their dispatchers.

Almost all the proposals were put into practice, including destroying the homes of terrorists, expelling terror activists, administrative detentions and waging an all-out war against the dawa institutions (Hamas’ welfare institutions). The assumption was that the planners and executors of terror attacks would hesitate to engage in murderous missions if they knew that Israel would extract a steep price from their family members. But suicide bombers continued to blow themselves up in the centers of Israel’s cities.